Nalco, Hind Copper shares fall up to 5% to hit one-week low as global metal prices retreat

Metal stocks plunge

• Metal stocks dropped sharply for 2nd day after a six-day rally due to profit booking and price falls.
• Nifty Metal index fell 3%, worst single-day drop since April 2025.
• Gold and silver prices declined; Tata Steel reported record crude steel output

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The shares of metal companies declined in trade, extending losses for the second consecutive session after a six-day rally. Sharp fall in metal prices, along with profit booking were among the key factors behind the sharp decline.

The Nifty Metal index fell nearly 3 percent to a one-week low of 11,215 in the morning trading hours of Thursday, recording the worst single-day percentage drop since April 2025

Why are metal stocks declining?

The sharp fall in the metal stocks may have been driven by profit booking in base metals. Copper, aluminium, gold and silver saw a massive surge recently, before beginning to decline as investors may have resorted to profit booking at elevated levels.

Silver futures on MCX declined up to Rs 4,000 per kilogram, while gold, aluminium and copper futures fell around 1 percent each. “Precious metals faced profit-taking ahead of commodity index rebalancing,” said Devarsh Vakil, Head of Prime Research at HDFC Securities.

Citi said that based on combined Bloomberg Commodity Index and S&P GSCI data, along with its proprietary estimates for index assets under management, gold is likely to see outflows of about $6.8 billion, while silver could witness outflows of roughly $6.8 billion as well during the annual rebalancing exercise, CNBC-TV18 reported.

Stocks in this sector were seeing profit-booking after a recent rally, Anshul Jain, technical analyst at Laxmi Shri Securities, said.

Metal stocks:

Hindustan Zinc shares were the top loser on the index, falling more than 5 percent as silver prices extended decline. National Aluminium Company (NALCO) tumbled around 5 percent.

Jindal Stainless Steel, Jindal Steel & Power, Vedanta and Hindustan Copper shares fell around 4 percent each, while Hindalco Industries, NMDC, Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL), JSW Steel and Tata Steel shares fell more than 2 percent each.

Notably, Tata Steel on Wednesday said its India operations manufactured a record high quantity of crude steel in the December quarter, at 6.34 million tonnes, up over 11 percent from 5.69 million tonnes produced in the year-ago quarter. The production growth was attributed to higher output at Tata Steel's Jamshedpur and Kalinganagar factories.

APL Apollo Tubes, Adani Enterprises and Welspun Corp shares fell more than 1 percent each.

Prior to the decline in the current session and yesterday, the Nifty Metal index had risen for six consecutive days, during which it gained almost 5 percent. The index ended flat on Wednesday. It has surged over 11 percent in the last 30 days, but has seen a muted performance in seven prior trading sessions.

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